Six months of war in Ukraine | The immense price of an aborted trial

It was in 1991. The dissident Vladimir Bukovsky had returned from exile to question the new Russian president, Boris Yeltsin. To convince him to set up a big trial to judge the crimes of the Soviet era, which had just ended. And he succeeded.

At the start of his first term, Boris Yeltsin gave his approval to the creation of a commission to scrutinize the entire Soviet repressive machine, which alone has caused at least 20 million deaths in 70 years. Gulags, arbitrary executions, poisonings, internments in psychiatric hospitals: all the means were good to make reign fear. Silence dissent.

At the heart of this freedom-crushing system, there was of course the Communist Party and all its apparatchiks, but also the KGB and the organizations infiltrated by the secret services, including the Orthodox Church. In a trial, all these beautiful people were going to face their responsibilities.

To carry out the historical commission set up by Vladimir Bukovsky, an impressive panel of Russian and foreign experts has been selected.

And then ?

And then, nothing. In 1992, Boris Yeltsin abandoned the idea of ​​such a trial, and the crimes of the Soviet era remain unpunished to this day.

“Even today, Russians only know about 10% of the crimes that were committed against them during the Soviet period. We have always taken them for children that we can manipulate, to whom we lie constantly, ”says Hélène Blanc, russologist and researcher at the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), joined in Paris.

In his book Nuremberg of communism, the trial forbiddenpublished in 2017, M^me Blanc tells this forgotten story, but terribly relevant on this day which marks the sixth month of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Because one historical event paved the way for another.

Nazi Germany had the Nuremberg trials. Apartheid South Africa had its Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Soviet Russia had wall to wall impunity.

So it’s hardly surprising that the leader of post-Soviet Russia—coming from the ranks of a newly reinvented KGB—believes himself above law and justice. At home, but also abroad. In Chechnya, Georgia, Syria and now Ukraine.

The proliferation of war crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine illustrates his point. Even if these repeated violations of international law and the law of war have been documented in real time since the beginning of the conflict, and despite the fact that the international courts are already seized of them, Vladimir Putin continues for the moment to crack down without fear of see Interpol land in the Kremlin.

If I wanted to revisit this hidden chapter of Russian history, it is partly because I was surprised by the reactions of several readers after the publication last month of a column on Vladimir Fedorovski, former Gorbachev-era diplomat.

To end the war, the latter urges Ukraine and Western countries to reach an agreement with Russia as soon as possible, even if it means cutting up Ukraine permanently by granting independence. to Crimea and Donbass.

Mr. Fedorovski even suggests that the West—through a new Marshall Plan—pay for the reconstruction of the country destroyed by Moscow. And all this to prevent Vladimir Putin from resorting to nuclear weapons.

Many of you enthusiastically welcomed this proposal, but allow me to dissent.

If the past sheds light on the future, the path of appeasement seems to be the worst to take to curb Vladimir Putin in his inclinations. If Ukraine, with the support of the West, bowed down now, what would prevent the Russian president from going after another country in a few months or resuming the harassment of his neighbor? ?

Nothing, nada, nichevo.

Because if Russian history shows us one thing, it is that unpunished crimes tend to have children. Ukrainians, who today celebrate in fear the 31^e anniversary of their accession to independence, are already paying too dearly the price.